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It used to be that a large part of owning a cellphone, using it a lot, and being on the road involved hauling around a massive charging unit. When your plan expired, you got a new phone – and along with that came a new car charger, a new brick to plug in at home and a second one to be wrapped up in a ball and shoved in your briefcase or purse.

This changed a while back with the adoption of MiniUSB connectors by many manufacturers. The bulky adapters were gone, replaced by a single thin cable. The car adapter was replaced by a lighter socket-to-USB converter.

Better yet, MiniUSB cables were everywhere: MP3 players, external hard drives, card readers, cameras ... you name it. Best of all, since it seemed that everything has a USB port, you could charge your phone off of just about anything.

Sadly, not everyone jumped on the MiniUSB bandwagon. Most notably reticent was Apple; MiniUSB connectors were too fat for their iconic consumer tat. The cellphone industry flailed around for a while, however they eventually settled on MicroUSB as the way of the future.

Even Apple has given way; I have been led to understand that the next round of fondle-gadgetry to come equipped with standardised connectors – for charging, at least. This is certainly the case in Europe.

Surely though, I wouldn’t be so uppity about a mere charging source? As it turns out, there’s more to it than that. The proliferation of MicroUSB – both as an interface and also in the readily available plethora of cables – is a fantastic enabler for someone looking to get around security.

When the average punter stops to ponder the abilities of their iThingy, it’s usually to marvel at how they no longer have to carry around a separate MP3 player or video player.

In many cases, they have even managed to replace their netbook with the basic browsing features of their light-up vibrating internet fondletoy. They’d be right too: without rooting the device, this is about all the average punter can really get up to on Apple’s devices.